Sony RX10 at 3200 ISO.
When we last left off the chairman of the Visual Science Lab had just written about a lovely evening at the theater shooting an hilarious but traditionally produced play called, In the Room Next Door. The folks at Zach Theater were rehearsed to the nth degree and the production staff were as flawless and accurate as a computer. And not just a generic computer....a really good computer. Go see that essay (which is a paean to the RX10) here: http://visualsciencelab.blogspot.com/2014/01/my-theatrical-test-of-sony-rx10-and.html
Well, yesterday I went to a different kind of theater production. No less fun but where the production the night before was perfectly regimented yesterday's fare was all about improvisation and on the fly, on the stage direction. The production was: The Bowie Project: A Rock and Roll Soundpainting. And you can read more about it in the Austin Chronicle, here: http://www.austinchronicle.com/arts/2014-01-31/the-bowie-project-a-rock-and-roll-soundpainting/
I was pre-recession busy yesterday with raw post processing in the morning, some accounting for Ben's college apps over lunch and a bunch of portrait retouching for a large medical practice for the first half of the afternoon. I remembered (almost at the last minute: thanks, iCal!!!) that I'd promised my friend, Colin, that I'd photograph the final dress rehearsal for his project (The David Bowie Soundpainting) and I needed to be right in the middle of downtown in less than half an hour.
Fortunately it's VSL policy to charge batteries and back up cards the minute we walk into the studio from assignment so the cameras were packed and ready to go. One Sony RX10, two Panasonic GH3s and a couple of fun lenses for the m4:3 camera. Should have just left it at home since the RX10 worked charmingly.
So, here's the deal. The Bowie play is completely improv. There's no script. There are snippets of choreography. There is a modern dance company involved. A Bowie singer. A rock band. A guy who let the fog machine run wild and two guys named Steve who loved playing with all of the cyberlights and catwalk mounted gelled spots---sometimes all at the same time. The direction? Shoot whatever you want from wherever you want. The play will last for between about 45 minutes to maybe 70 minutes. It might be longer. There's no intermission. Go!
I love most of David Bowie's music and it's always fun to see entertainers engaged in pure play so I just went for it. Here's a selection.....
Panasonic GH3. 25mm.
Panasonic GH3. 25mm.
Panasonic GH3. 25mm.
RX10 wide open at 3200.
5 comments:
Thanks for sharing. The richness of the images, smooth tonality, great saturation, freedom from obvious noise at high ISO speak spades about what one can do with modest sized sensors. Who would have guessed, even a couple of years ago?
Guetting skin tones right in all those psychotic color changes is the true magic feat to me here. Wow.
those camera are rubish : i can see one pixel doing some noise :D
Seriously, this is absolutely impressive. i would have bet a hand that i would see more noise on the picture. I can't see any ! This is wonderful :D
These all look great and it's going to cost me money. On another note, posting on dpreview is asking for lunatic trouble.
Just like to mention that from the photos it seems that the camera handles great direct light sources (projectors, shiny objects etc') in the frame. With no distortion or artifacts. This goes against common wisdom (until now ?) of small sensors.
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